FPL to invest about $500 million to strengthen electric system against storms

May 3, 2013|By Doreen Hemlock, SunSentinel

Florida Power & Light plans to invest about $500 million over the next three years to strengthen its electric distribution system against wind and flood damage from storms, executives announced.

The outlay is about the same amount as the state's largest utility spent on "hardening" its system over the past five years, but at a rate almost twice as fast, spokesman Greg Brostowicz said Friday.

Customers will not be assessed a rate hike in their bills to cover the added investment, since FPL already received approval from regulators last year for its rate increase for four years, Brostowicz said.

Subscribers should see a difference, however, in the quality of their electric service in case of a storm. FPL systems should better withstand severe weather and return to service faster, executives said.

"It's not a matter of if a hurricane hits in Florida, it's a matter of when. We're investing now to ensure that customers can get back to normal as quickly as possible after a storm," said Brostowicz.

FPL said it applied lessons from floods that accompanied Superstorm Sandy in the U. S. northeast last year in devising its latest investment plans.

Among them: place meters that measure water levels near major facilities in low-lying areas, so machinery can be turned off automatically, should high water approach. Preventive shutdowns can reduce the time of outages, compared to water hitting machines still in use, executives said.

Also included in the $428 million to $646 million investment plan:

Strengthen poles and equipment for more than 250 critical facilities such as hospitals. That involves switching some wood poles to concrete and cutting some spaces between poles.

Deploy more wind-resistant transmission structures and equipment. That includes upgrading some ceramic post insulators with a more resistant polymer material, executives added.

The new program builds on a nearly $460 million investment by FPL since 2007 to strengthen its system, especially to serve facilities critical to communities such as police and fire stations, 911 centers, water-treatment plants, grocery stores, gas stations and pharmacies.

FPL has found that main power lines that have been "hardened': are about half as likely to experience an outage during severe weather. Even under normal weather conditions, hardening a power line reduces the frequency of daily outages by up to 40 percent, the company said.

The utility announced the investments, as it completed its annual drill preparing for the June 1 start of hurricane season.

This year's week-long drill assumed a Category 3 hurricane entered Florida's west coast around Cape Coral and exited on the east coast around Port St. Lucie. The simulation involved more than 3,000 people in the 35-county area that FPL serves, including more than 100 at its command center.

The drill paid special attention this year to coordinating arrivals of crews from other utilities – some from out of state. That included finding places for crews to sleep and eat, often at airports or fairgrounds.